John Lott: President Obama’s Anti-Gun Agenda Shows No Sign of Stopping
Many in the mainstream media, and certainly many anti-gun types like to suggest – or is pretend – that President Obama hasn’t done much in the way of gun control. The media, time and time again, looks past those measures.
But fortunately this week John Lott, writing for FoxNews.com offered why we should watch the POTUS very carefully in an op-ed titled “President Obama’s Anti-Gun Agenda Shows No Sign of Stopping.”
John Lott: What’s Wrong With Making It Easier to Carry a Gun Across State Lines?
This week our friend John Lott, writing for Fox News, offered some compelling reasons why licenses for guns should be treated like those for cars, which he says is “something that gun control advocates wanted.” He notes that Al Gore suggested such a program when he ran for president. But now that it is happening, gun control types don’t like.
Lott says:
You don’t need a driver’s license to drive a car on private property, merely on public roads. And once you get a license, you are allowed to drive any car on any public road anywhere in the United States. You are responsible for obeying the different traffic regulations in different states, but as long as you do, you are fine.
Of course we know what gun control types really want, which is to make it harder – not easier – for law-abiding citizens to have guns.
Read more: John Lott: What’s Wrong With Making It Easier to Carry a Gun Across State Lines?
John Lott: “Blame Bush – Is That Holder’s Strategy to Get Out of ‘Fast and Furious’ Mess?”
Our friend John Lott asked, the question this week, namely “Blame Bush – Is That Holder’s Strategy to Get Out of ‘Fast and Furious’ Mess?” We have to answer, it appears to be so. Lott, writing for FoxNews.com, suggested:
Blame Bush. It has been almost three years since President Obama took office, yet he still blames Bush for the bad economy. Now the Obama administration is following the same strategy to get out of the “Fast and Furious” mess.
Lott also noted that this “Blame Bush” strategy is very much in the works:
The Obama administration has also tried to show the practice originated in the Bush administration during 2006 and 2007 under operation “Wide Receiver.” After all, it is what Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer argued just last week. When Breuer testified last week, he confessed that he had learned about “gun walking” tactics as far back as April 2010, but it wasn’t the Obama administration’s “gun walking” that he confessed to learning about, it was a program run briefly during the Bush administration.
So how did this happen and why? Lott is not alone in his thinking. First he noted:
What is really missed by all this is the utter failure of gun tracing programs. The problem isn’t really that the Obama administration simply screwed up the tracing plan. Few guns move from the U.S. to Mexico and just as drug cartels bring in drugs from other countries, they can bring in the weapons that they need to protect those drugs. Mexican drug cartels aren’t getting their machine guns, grenades, and rocket launchers from the United States.
This is contrary to much of what has been made in the media that 70, 80 or even as much as 90 percent of guns used in Mexico come from the United States. Of course as we’ve also noted, it is hard to figure out where those machine guns, grenades and rocket launchers were coming from. It certainly wasn’t gun shops in Texas. We can see this, our friend John Lott and many others can see this. So why did outlets such as The Washington Post and Christian Science Monitor stick with those 70, 80 or 90 percent figures for so long?
And Lott asked another good question:
Why would the Obama administration not trace the guns? Why would they not inform Mexican officials about the program? One hopes that it was sheer incompetence combined with a desire to stonewall any investigation, but the fact that people knew that the guns weren’t being traced raises questions even about this plan.
Finally, Lott noted something we have long considered too. It is one that bears repeating, even if it sounds a bit crazy:
The only other possibility — deliberately increasing the number of guns sold to increase the share of crime guns in Mexico from the United States and thus generate support for more gun control — is conceivable if only because “Fast and Furious” started at the same time that Obama began his campaign falsely claiming that most Mexican crime guns came from the United States.
This does sound “out there,” but again consider that President Obama – before he was POTUS – has been very anti-gun. He voted for gun control when he was in government in Illinois and was a pro-gun control U.S. Senator. But to get to the White House he had to cool it a bit. However, he has since said to Sarah Brady that he was working on gun control but “under the radar.” Is Fast and Furious part of that “under the radar.” And is he only being quiet on gun control in the run up to next year’s election? Time will tell, but voters should know these facts.
John Lott: Media Silence Is Deafening About Important Gun News
Our friend John Lott wrote an excellent op-ed for FoxNews.com last Friday, titled, “Media Silence Is Deafening About Important Gun News.” He essentially notes, “murder and violent crime rates were supposed to soar after the Supreme Court struck down gun control laws in Chicago and Washington, D.C.”
And have you heard about the crime rates? Probably not, because as Lott notes… they have fallen. He writes:
“Not surprisingly, the national media have been completely silent about this news. One can only imagine the coverage if crime rates had risen. In the first six months of this year, there were 14% fewer murders in Chicago compared to the first six months of last year – back when owning handguns was illegal. It was the largest drop in Chicago’s murder rate since the handgun ban went into effect in 1982.”
The media likes news on guns… but only when it is bad. There is the saying, “if it bleeds, it leads.” Sad but very true.
SAF, SCCC HOSTING ‘SUPPORTING CAMPUS CONCEALED CARRY’ FORUM AUGUST 8th
The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF), in cooperation with Students for Concealed Carry on Campus (SCCC), is hosting a forum “Supporting Concealed Carry on Campus” on Monday, August 8th at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., Noon to 5 p.m.
The forum is free and open to the public.
This event will feature a Gun Free Zones debate between Colin Goddard of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, and John Lott, author of More Guns, Less Crime.
An academic panel that includes Prof. Nelson Lund (George Mason University), Prof. Bob Cottrol (George Washington University) and Prof. Joyce Lee Malcolm (George Mason University) is also on the program.
Another panel will discuss legislation supporting campus concealed carry. This panel includes Texas State Sen. Jeff Wentworth, Wisconsin Rep. Evan Wynn and Idaho Rep. Erik Simpson.
Also appearing is Attorney Alan Gura, who successfully argued the cases of District of Columbia v. Heller and McDonald v. Chicago resulting in U.S. Supreme Court rulings that struck down the handgun ban in Washington, D.C. as a violation of the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms and the handgun ban in Chicago by incorporating the Second Amendment to all fifty states through the Fourteenth Amendment.
Student panels will discuss the campus concealed carry efforts as well as personal experiences of self-defense and crime on college campuses.
Other speakers include SAF Founder Alan Gottlieb and Students for Concealed Carry on Campus President Dan Crocker.
John Lott Asks: What’s Really Behind Obama’s New Push for Gun Control?
Writing for Fox News, our friend John Lott asks the tough question: What’s Really Behind Obama’s New Push for Gun Control? While his defenders typically point out that he isn’t looking to take away Second Amendment rights, and gun control groups try to say they’re not happy with what he’s done (they wouldn’t be happy until guns are banned anyway), the truth is that Obama is no supporter of gun rights. Lott offers this thought:
“Obama has been a consistent opponent of gun ownership. He enacted a ban on the importation of semiautomatic guns because, “The U.S. insisted that imports of the aging rifles could cause problems such as firearm accidents.” He has proposed much more extensive reporting requirements on sales of long guns. Obama’s nomination of anti-gun Andrew Traver to head the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives threatens imposing many new regulations. Still further, the Obama administration has actively pushed for the U.N.’s Arms Trade Treaty and continues to make inaccurate statements about the source of Mexico’s crime guns.”
These examples prove that this president is no friend of gun owners.
Media Matters Attempts to Debunk John Lott, While Offering Its Own Flawed Research
This week Media Matters attempted to debunk John Lott’s defense of the National Rifle Association, and in doing so tried to make President Obama look less anti-gun. The article tries to imply that Obama hasn’t banned importation of firearms, while adding that the gun lobby has been “short on facts.”
In fact, Media Matters is the one short on facts. The article fails to note that the EPA last year tried to push for a ban on lead ammunition, and that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton helped block the importation of firearms from South Korea.
It is interesting to see that media misinformation doesn’t matter to those people.
John Lott on FoxNews.com Calls out NY Times Error
What a surprise, an error in the Old Gray Lady – that would be what The New York Times is often known as – but that’s the deal. Our friend John Lott actually complied a number of mistakes, errors and carefully worded lapses that cover or conceal the truth.
We recommend this one, as he points out several glaring issues: “Another Mistake in The New York Times”
John Lott Sums it Up Best
In his latest rant for FoxNews John Lott sums up the ongoing gun issue quite well: Let’s Face It, Chicago’s Mayor Richard Daley Wants to Ban Guns, All Guns. John has offered some excellent commentary in the past, but his take on exactly what the Chicago gun laws, enacted since the SCOTUS ruling, really mean.
Here is a sample:
“Let’s face it, Mayor Richard Daley wants to ban guns, all guns. And he thinks that a complete ban is a “reasonable” regulation. The Supreme Court has ruled that he is not allowed to ban guns, but this is not going to change his mind about guns in the slightest. Daley now wants to place as restrictive rules as he thinks that the courts will let him get away with. Pretending that these rules are anything more than an attempt to limit gun ownership as much as possible is simply dishonest.”
John Lott Takes Aim at Gun Laws and Gun Critics
Kudos again to John Lott, who set the record straight again when it comes to how the media covers gun crimes. As Lott notes many news features offer quotes from anti-gun groups, often times without checking the full facts.
